


Beautiful

by LostCauses (Anteros)



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Angst, Devotion, Eruri Week, Eruri Week 2016, M/M, bitter sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-21
Updated: 2016-02-21
Packaged: 2018-05-22 09:51:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6074742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anteros/pseuds/LostCauses
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Levi never really left him.  He’s always there by his side.  More real and solid, more alive, than this world of ghosts that Erwin inhabits.</p><p>A short bitter sweet ficlet written for Canon Eruri Week 2016 day 8 prompt - Devotion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beautiful

Erwin traces the contours of Levi’s face with his eyes. Committing every angle and plane and curve to memory. He doesn’t dare touch.

Levi looks so much younger when he’s sleeping that Erwin often wonders what he looked like as a child. 

Heavy lids flicker open.

“What the fuck are you looking at?”

“You.”

“Have I got shit on my face or something?”

“No.”

“Then why’re you staring?” 

“Because you’re beautiful.”

“Tch.”

Levi rolls his eyes.

* * *

Erwin traces the contours of Levi’s face with his eyes. He doesn’t dare touch. 

One side of his face is completely obscured by blood. Erwin isn’t even sure it’s still there beneath the gore.

Heavy lids flicker open.

“What the fuck are you looking at?” 

His voice is barely audible.

“You.”

“Have I got shit on my face or something?”

His breath is rattling from his lips in wet gasps.

“No.”

“Then why

And Erwin sees it. The moment the fierce light in his eyes is extinguished. The exact moment that bright, stubborn spark fades and dies. The impossible moment when Levi just stops.

“You’re beautiful.”

* * *

Erwin lives. He survives the fall of the walls. Of course he does. But it doesn’t feel like a victory. It doesn’t feel like a life. Not when so many have died.

This is his penance; to live on. He often wonders how many men he sent to die. Hundreds? Thousands? Tens of thousands? There was no final reckoning. He measures their lives in days. One day endured for each life lost. It’s a paltry recompense. Even if he lives to be a hundred, there will never be enough days.

He’s the only one left. Of course he is. The 104th are all gone. Even Hanji, who made it right through to the bitter end, only to fall at the last.

It’s just him.

And Levi. 

Levi never really left him. He’s always there by his side. Where his right hand used to be. More real and solid, more alive, than this world of ghosts that Erwin inhabits. Erwin knows he only needs to turn his head to see him. He never turns, doesn’t need to, he knows he’s there. Erwin closes his eyes and traces the contours of Levi’s face, every angle and plane and curve committed to memory. He reaches out his right hand and touches him, his skin smooth and warm under his fingertips.

He’s still beautiful.


End file.
